Most magazines written for teen girls would never start a fashion article with the sentence “I’ve been fat and hairy my whole life,” but Shameless isn’t trying to be like most teen magazines. What started as a journalism project 10 years ago has transformed into an independent magazine for, and often by, the kind of […]

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Most magazines written for teen girls would never start a fashion article with the sentence “I’ve been fat and hairy my whole life,” but Shameless isn’t trying to be like most teen magazines. What started as a journalism project 10 years ago has transformed into an independent magazine for, and often by, the kind of young women who don’t often see themselves in the pages of mass-marketed magazines: people of colour, of disability, of non-binary gender representation, and more.

Julia Horel began as a Shameless blogger several years ago, and after stints as the magazine’s web director and blog editor, has been in the publisher’s seat since February 2014. Originally from Saskatoon, Horel came to Toronto six years ago after earning a Masters in Publishing from Simon Fraser University. She’s now the general manager of a book publishing distribution collective, and her knowledge of accounting, distribution, and the Canadian book and magazine landscape dovetails neatly with Shameless‘s needs. Like everyone involved with Shameless, Horel is a volunteer, but “I’m the business leader of Shameless, so my goals are more about the organization. The main goal is to make the magazine sustainable enough that we can afford to pay our staff and contributors.” Shameless is now in its 10th year of publication, a milestone it’ll be celebrating later this year with a gala fundraiser.

Our interview with Horel—about feminism on the internet, the challenges of working solely with volunteers, and the power of a good proof-reading session—is below.

Torontoist: What exactly does an independent magazine publisher do?

Julia Horel: Shameless is a bit unique, partly in that it’s completely volunteer-run. We publish only three times a year, so our cycle is a bit longer than magazines that publish monthly or every other month. Some of the things I do include taking care of all the financials, like paying the bills. I manage the team that handles circulation and advertising, and the team that handles events. We have launch parties for every issue and a gala fundraiser every year, so I oversee the team members whose roles are to organize those things. Shameless is also a non-profit, so some of our mandate is about serving teen girls and trans youth specifically, and the social justice community in Toronto and Canada more broadly, so we also have tables at events, we try to have a presence at things like Word on the Street and more specific social justice activism space like the Toronto Queer Zine Fair.

We are maybe less focused on money, which sounds kind of funny, but at the moment we’re just trying to get enough money to keep the magazine going. Most magazines have funding, but we don’t. We don’t have any grants; part of my job is to explore possibilities of grants that we might be eligible for, but it’s actually really hard to get grants as a magazine in Canada. There are a lot of criteria for the major granting bodies, our circulation is too low, and we just don’t qualify. There aren’t a lot of emerging-magazine grants, and to qualify for a lot of those grants, we have to pay our contributors … but we can’t pay our contributors because we don’t have any money. It’s kind of a chicken and egg situation. It’s hard to get ongoing operational grants, and the grants that we can get are often project-based, so we have to come up with extra things to do to get money to supplement what you’re already doing—but then you have to do those things, too! [Laughs]

How did Shameless’s mandate become to speak with and about young women and trans youth? It seems like such a clear response to mainstream teen media.

You’re absolutely right. The magazine was founded in 2004 by two journalism students, Nicole Cohen and Melinda Mattos. They’re both still involved in the magazine and sit on the board now, and they founded it as a journalism project for school and then decided to carry on with it after they graduated. It was a direct response to their feeling that there were no magazines that spoke to young people that didn’t just talk about how to wear your hair and attract boys. Our mandate has evolved over the years to become much more explicitly trans-inclusive. That’s been really important to us. The makeup of the collective has changed, and we’re much more focused now on being really intersectional in terms of race, class, gender, identity, disability and those kinds of things. We want to be speaking to teens who don’t get to see themselves in mainstream media.

The magazine was founded for young women. The founders, as they were conceiving of the magazine, were using an inclusive definition of the word “woman,” so they were absolutely considering trans women to be women. Over the years, as more people have joined the collective who are more politically aware, who have worked in and are part of various communities, and they’ve brought their influence into the magazine. It’s really important for us to speak to all youth who aren’t seen in mainstream media, and that includes youth who are gender nonconforming, and youth who are trans, or transitioning, or youth whose gender presentation doesn’t fit the mainstream. It’s just as important for us to include youth of colour or disability. It’s something that we’re constantly working on.

How do you go about producing feminist content for a younger crowd? What changes and what stays the same?

Our style assumes that teen readers and youth are intelligent and are just as curious and eager to learn as adults. We write and produce material that is accessible—that is, someone who is new to it can easily jump in and understand—but that doesn’t talk down. It’s not necessarily a 101, and we hope that no matter where people are on the feminism spectrum, they can jump in. It’s part of the reason we had, and hope to have again, a youth advisory board. It can be hard because none of our team are in their teens, and we try to remember that teens are just as smart as adults, and they care about the same things. We also include teen voices, like our “Talking Back” column, which is always in the magazine and which is always written by teens, and a lot of our web content is now being written by youth.

The feminist presence in the media seem to have expanded since Shameless was first launched, and there are now a lot of different voices: Jezebel, The Hairpin, The Toast. How have you seen feminist media change in the last decade?

I think it’s changed a lot. We have to thank or blame the internet—probably thank—because it does have a way of democratizing media a little bit. But just because there’s a platform for voices doesn’t mean they’re the ones who are getting heard. Way more people have heard of Jezebel, for instance, than have heard of Racialicious, which is an incredible site by and for people of colour. It’s changed, and it’s great that there are more women, but it’s the same voices that are still being amplified the loudest. It’s still often a particular type of voice and woman: white, American, middle-class women, and people who can afford to write for free, which is limiting. There need to be more women of colour, more trans folks, more people with disabilities.

How do you manage an all-volunteer team?

It’s hard, because the type of people who volunteer to write for a feminist magazine are also the type of people who are really busy doing a lot of different things that they’re really passionate about. This isn’t anyone’s only thing. The biggest problem is time management, but everyone who’s doing this is there because they really believe in the project, and they love the community and the work. We can offer people a title and some training, but people aren’t working at Shameless because of mercenary reasons. The best part is working with the team and learning from everybody. Even the conversations we have about semantics during proof-reading sessions teach me something. We lean incredibly heavily on Sheila Sampath, who is both our editorial and art director and many other things. She manages just about every aspect of the magazine except the business side. We set deadlines way in advance, and we start to plan the next issue before the next one is put to bed, and that helps a lot. But really, it’s a lot of follow-up and a lot of commitment from people on the team. If someone is going to leave, they usually finish up the current issue, and we can get someone to shadow them and take on the next issue. That helps a lot.

]]>http://torontoist.com/2014/09/i-want-your-job-julia-horel-publisher-of-shameless-magazine/feed/0The Women Behind the Wheelhttp://torontoist.com/2013/10/the-women-behind-the-wheel/
http://torontoist.com/2013/10/the-women-behind-the-wheel/#commentsWed, 16 Oct 2013 16:30:35 +0000http://torontoist.com/?p=283146Torontoist spoke to two women who make their living behind the wheel.

In this city of taxicabs—4,849 are officially registered with the City of Toronto—only a handful of its cab drivers are women. No official statistics were available, but the number of women drivers is well under ten, according to word-of-mouth estimates. There are safety risks inherent in the profession, but more than that, it’s a culture […]

]]>Torontoist spoke to two women who make their living behind the wheel.

Shirley Marashi in front of her taxi.

In this city of taxicabs—4,849 are officially registered with the City of Toronto—only a handful of its cab drivers are women. No official statistics were available, but the number of women drivers is well under ten, according to word-of-mouth estimates. There are safety risks inherent in the profession, but more than that, it’s a culture that’s been carved out by male drivers. Some women cite fear of assault; others, alienation. Regardless of the complex and overlapping barriers, women have yet to move into the industry in large numbers. But some have. We spoke with two women cab drivers recently about their experience as the exceptions, and about where they think women fit within the industry.Driver: Etsehiwot EjiguAge: 38Years driving a taxi: Five

What made you become a cabdriver?
It is work. It’s work. I’m a single mom. You can work any time. Any time I need to go pick up the kids, it’s flexible to drive the taxi. And good business. I used to work a front desk at an office. But it’s hard when you’re a mom. When [my daughter] had pink eye, when she was sick, I’d bring her into the office. She’d be under the table. And they called for the manager, and they said “Oh, she’s with her daughter.” They like to talk, I don’t know. Now with the taxi, if she’s sick I come home.

How many kids do you have?
One, a daughter. She’s teenager, so don’t put anything to embarrass her.

What do you like about your job?
I love to talk. It’s independent, nice work. When you need coffee, you need to go somewhere, you can work, too. If you have pay a lot for renting, you work hard. In this system, the taxi system, you rent per week. Like apartments. You pay $500 for this taxi—it’s more money for you if you don’t work. And sometimes if you don’t get money, you get more stressed out.

And what don’t you like about it?
You know? This rate is $500. And we’re crazy in the street—you see us—taxi drivers are crazy because we have a lot of stress. The city don’t think about how much we pay, how much we get, they just see the taxi do this, the taxi do that, the taxi do—because with most of the stress, I don’t like this job. And sometimes people don’t pay. Some people say they forgot money, and they say they’ll come back and they never do.

How many other women work with you?
Out of this company of around two thousand taxis, we have maybe five ladies working. Really. The woman is scared. I don’t want to drive around at night; it’s no good. But daytime, we are good. I work for Beck Taxi—we have a two-way radio. This is safe. You know when something happens? I say something, everyone hears, and people are here in one minute. This is safe. If a woman is scared because someone is behind you always, a scary guy and scary ladies, too, they take you out of town. They can take you anywhere. And because of that, it’s not so safe. But for me? I have to, have to have this radio. This radio saves lives.

You’ve never had an altercation, or a close call?
No, nobody. Somebody hit me? No. Because I am smart. And they might try to, but they forget because I talk too much. And when you are a lady, everybody says, “Oh my gosh, you’re a lady!” They’re surprised to see me, you know? Some say, “Oh, you’re a driver? Is this your husband’s car?” No. I do not drive my husband’s car; this is my car. Always they’re surprised, not to attack you, they’re surprised.

It’s a good surprise. Does that help with tips?
(Laughs) No. I work. I rent this car for $500 a week; it takes at least seven days to cover that. I cover that in five days, because Saturday and Sunday I have to take care of my daughter. That’s my job, you know—cooking, cleaning. I always have both jobs. And in five days, I work hard. Never, ever stop. No lunch. We make maybe $5 per hour, maybe $40 per hour. But there’s no taxi stand anywhere; we struggle. But through all this, we survive. I work. Sometimes it’s not so good, but it’s work.

How long do you work each day?
I work from six to six. When you get customers? Okay. But if you don’t get customers, you’re standing most of the time.

Why don’t you think there are more women cab drivers?
I don’t know—they’re scared. For me, they’re scared. They’re scared for me, too. They say, “Are you sure you want to drive a taxi? How?” You know, I drive a taxi because it’s my job. This camera’s working; this radio’s working. We have a GPS to say wherever you are. They might think it’s dangerous, but it isn’t. If ladies like to drive, drive. But you have to have patience, because you don’t make money always.

If you could go back, would you choose a different career in Toronto?
I know how to make a car; I know how to weld. Back in Ethiopia, I was a mechanic. But I can’t be that here because you have to go to school another 10 years to change your profession. I wish I had my own profession. But otherwise, I’m trying to make time to teach driving. Have benefits. Now, sometimes I can work another job, but nighttime is not comfortable for me.

Now I tell other drivers how to fix their cars. They tell me advice; I tell them how to make their car. Most taxi drivers here are professionals. They are doctors; they are engineers. In this country, it’s not easy to transfer one degree for another degree.

Do you have any advice for other female cab drivers?
We are ladies. We are ladies with opportunities. We shouldn’t be surprising because we are drivers—we are working! What is the difference? He drive somebody, and me drive somebody. Nighttime? Yeah I’m crazy because it’s dangerous. Daytime? I drive. When I get money, I got it. When I don’t get money, I don’t get it. That is the point. Because there is no difference. We all drive with a hand and a leg.

Driver: Shirley MarashiAge: 55Years driving a taxi: Almost eight

Why did you choose to become a driver?
It all started out with my husband. He’s a driver, too. He had a car that he was leasing out, and Ambassadors can’t buy new plates, but he could at least do it with my name. [Editor’s note: Toronto taxis have a two-tiered plate system, Standard and Ambassador. While Standard plates are a hot commodity and have been known to sell in the six figures, Ambassador licences are non-transferrable and can’t be bought or sold.] That was the reason in the beginning. But then it became like any other job. You start doing it, and you just do it. You just fall into it.

Do you enjoy it?
I do enjoy it.

I’m a people person, and I love driving. With those two things combined, it makes it easier. If you don’t like those two things, you really have no business in this business. It’s dealing with people, and it’s driving. I don’t mind driving in any kind of weather, unless it’s treacherous. Also in the beginning, like seven years ago, I still had a couple of kids in grade school, so I was flexible to get to where they were if they needed me. Now they’re in high school, and I’m still running around with them.

Sounds like a good deal. Is there anything about the job that you don’t particularly enjoy?
I wish it was a little bit busier. There are so many of us, some days it’s hard to make a good living. If it’s slow, it’s no fun. So that would be my least favourite part of the job. When business is moving, I really like the job. I like the money, and I like the guys I work with. They all treat me great. In the beginning, that’s one thing I was leery of. I thought they were looking at me like a two-headed monster. But that was just me, thinking “Where the heck is she coming from?” But it wasn’t like that. They’re all very respectful guys.

You learn a lot about people in this business. It’s quite equivalent to being a bartender. You hear lots of stories; you meet lots of nice people. You rarely meet someone that’s not nice. That’s a great thing about our city. I’ve never been in danger in seven and a half years. I’ve never felt threatened.

You’ve never felt under threat as a woman in this industry?
Never. I only work days, and I work a lot with the radio. A couple of times over the years, I might have had someone in the seat who made me feel anxious, because they were anxious. Like, say you pick up someone who called you late—they’re already late, and they’re making you feel that kind of pressure. That’s no fun; you can’t wait to get rid of them. But other than that, it’s just like any other job. All of us are out here. We all have lives and are paying bills, mortgages, raising kids, getting our kids through university. It’s a living.

If you could go back, would you still choose to be a cab driver?
I don’t say that I would not be a cab driver, and I don’t know how long I will be a cab driver. I was a legal secretary for years, and that’s something I don’t want to go back to. That says something, doesn’t it? Maybe there’s something else I’d like to do. Don’t know what that would be, but for now I’ll do this and see where it takes me.

Do you have any advice for other women in the industry?
Always ask the customer if they have a way they’d like to go. That’s really important. If someone’s not nice, just be very nice back to them. Try to enjoy the ride. Like I said, I very seldom have a problem. I think you’re going to see more women [drivers] in the next few years. Mark my words.

WHERE: Yonge, Queen, and Bay streets WHEN: September 26, 12 p.m. WHAT: As you can probably tell by looking at the pictures in the image gallery, these guys are not accustomed to wearing high heels. That’s because they only did it for a couple hours this afternoon, as part of an event called Walk a […]

WHAT: As you can probably tell by looking at the pictures in the image gallery, these guys are not accustomed to wearing high heels. That’s because they only did it for a couple hours this afternoon, as part of an event called Walk a Mile in Her Shoes. It was a fundraiser, and the proceeds will go to White Ribbon, an organization that works to mobilize men and boys to end violence against women.

]]>http://torontoist.com/2013/09/scene-men-put-on-high-heels-for-charity/feed/0Duly Quoted: Jaye Robinson on the Mayor, Being Booted from Executive Committee, and Women at City Hallhttp://torontoist.com/2013/06/duly-quote-jaye-robinson-on-the-mayor-being-booted-from-executive-committee-and-women-at-city-hall/
http://torontoist.com/2013/06/duly-quote-jaye-robinson-on-the-mayor-being-booted-from-executive-committee-and-women-at-city-hall/#commentsTue, 11 Jun 2013 15:15:50 +0000http://torontoist.com/?p=258763

“I believe the mayor will be more comfortable with an all-male cast on executive committee.” —Jaye Robinson (Ward 25, Don Valley West), speaking to reporters this morning in response to news that Rob Ford had booted her from the cabinet-like executive committee at City Hall. After her departure, executive committee consists of 13 men; by […]

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“I believe the mayor will be more comfortable with an all-male cast on executive committee.”

—Jaye Robinson (Ward 25, Don Valley West), speaking to reporters this morning in response to news that Rob Ford had booted her from the cabinet-like executive committee at City Hall. After her departure, executive committee consists of 13 men; by contrast, 15 of 44 councillors are women. Robinson says she was given no reason for the removal, but that she believes it was due both to her publicly calling on the mayor to temporarily step aside and deal with “personal issues” in the wake of crack cocaine allegations, and to a recent dispute with the mayor’s brother, Doug Ford (Ward 2, Etobicoke North), who falsely said that a meeting was cancelled at City Hall due to Robinson’s absence. She added that it was “absolutely clear” the mayor would not consider taking a leave of absence, and lamented that “it is unfortunate that the mayor no longer seems to have room for a diversity of voices or points of view.” Robinson has been replaced on the committee by a left-leaning member of council, Anthony Perruzza (Ward 8, York West).

]]>http://torontoist.com/2013/06/duly-quote-jaye-robinson-on-the-mayor-being-booted-from-executive-committee-and-women-at-city-hall/feed/43“Bravo for the Women of Canada”http://torontoist.com/2013/05/bravo-for-the-women-of-canada/
http://torontoist.com/2013/05/bravo-for-the-women-of-canada/#commentsThu, 30 May 2013 14:30:31 +0000http://torontoist.com/?p=256616

As anticipation mounted for the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision on the country’s abortion laws on January 28, 1988, residents and business owners near Dr. Henry Morgentaler’s clinic at 85 Harbord Street hoped the ruling would bring quiet to their neighbourhood. Since Morgentaler, who died Wednesday morning at the age of 90, opened his clinic […]

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Front page, the Globe and Mail, January 29, 1988.

As anticipation mounted for the Supreme Court of Canada’s decision on the country’s abortion laws on January 28, 1988, residents and business owners near Dr. Henry Morgentaler’s clinic at 85 Harbord Street hoped the ruling would bring quiet to their neighbourhood. Since Morgentaler, who died Wednesday morning at the age of 90, opened his clinic in June 1983, they had witnessed an endless stream of occasionally violent protests. “We think the street has gone through a lot, and showed a lot of patience as it has dealt with all this for the past years,” observed Harbord Street Association president Neil Wright.

The first protestors showed up outside the clinic around 7:30 that winter morning. Police erected rows of barricades to allow pedestrians to move around the growing crowd of pro-choice and anti-abortion activists. The pro side soon had reason to celebrate: in a five-to-two vote, the Supreme Court struck down Section 251 of the Criminal Code, which forced women seeking legal pregnancy terminations to submit to the approval of a hospital abortion committee.

Morgentaler, who had crusaded for women’s choice in Canada for two decades, and whose clinic was dragged through the legal system following a Metro Toronto Police raid within a month of its opening, was relieved. “Bravo for the Supreme Court of Canada,” he told the crowd waiting outside an Ottawa courtroom. “Bravo for the women of Canada. Justice for the women of Canada has finally arrived.”

Around 7 p.m. that evening, Morgentaler greeted supporters on Harbord Street. By that point, the pro-choice presence strongly outnumbered the opponents still outside the clinic. “No longer can women be treated as second-class citizens,” he declared. “I wish to repeat our slogan: Every child a wanted child and every mother a willing mother. Never again will we lose this right.”
All three of Toronto’s major dailies supported the court’s decision. The Globe and Mail felt the pressure was now on Parliament to stop “hiding behind a bad law” and create legislation that trusted doctors and pregnant women “to do the right thing.” The Star called the ruling “forceful” and “reasoned” in recognizing that the Charter of Rights didn’t permit the state to “unreasonably interfere with the personal reproductive choices of women.” The support wasn’t unanimous—a few columnists raised objections—but even among the Sun‘s conservative ranks the consensus was that the court had decided well. The Sun wrote that the ruling was “logical, inevitable, and necessary,” and reminded readers that both the Canadian Medical Association and Ontario Medical Association had passed resolutions six years earlier that closely matched the court’s decision.

Globe and Mail columnist Michele Landsberg found the decision dizzying, in a good way:

At a stroke, the Supreme Court of Canada has wiped out one of our country’s meanest injustices. The abortion law, a shabby and cringing deal made among men who rule, and made at the expense of women, has been named for what it is: painful, arbitrary, and unfair. Those who have not been personally touched by the women’s movement may find it hard to credit the depth of emotion we feel today. It’s important to understand that the abortion fight has not been about abortion, but something which runs far deeper: the right of women to be autonomous.

Back on Harbord Street, the decision didn’t quiet the battle. As governments tried to figure out new abortion legislation, skirmishes at the clinic continued, culminating in a firebombing in 1992. The clinic eventually moved to its current location in North Toronto.

Additional material from the January 29, 1988 and January 30, 1988 editions of the Globe and Mail, the January 28, 1988 and January 29, 1988 editions of the Toronto Star, and the January 29, 1988 and January 31, 1988 editions of the Toronto Sun.

Once upon a time, there was an unjust and harmful law. Someone raised his voice in opposition to this law—in fact, many people did—but ultimately words proved ineffective and the law remained in place. However, since this was not, in fact, a fairy tale but actual life in Canada, someone was required to lead a […]

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Front page, the Toronto Sun, January 29, 1988.

Once upon a time, there was an unjust and harmful law. Someone raised his voice in opposition to this law—in fact, many people did—but ultimately words proved ineffective and the law remained in place.

However, since this was not, in fact, a fairy tale but actual life in Canada, someone was required to lead a life of civil disobedience, deliberately breaking that law and suffering the consequences. “The consequences,” in this case, included spending months in jail and a small fortune on legal fees, plus a stress-induced heart attack while incarcerated. Also required: taking the cause repeatedly to the Supreme Court. It was, by any standard, an exceptionally stressful and difficult life, and one that was undermined regularly by private citizens threatening violence and death.

Morgentaler, a Holocaust survivor—he spent time at both Auschwitz and Dachau—came to Canada in 1950. He began practicing medicine in Montreal shortly thereafter, and opened his first abortion clinic in Montreal in 1969. Morgentaler later explained that, although he was initially reticent to break the law, he came to believe that performing abortions was a moral necessity given the danger that women exposed themselves to by electing to have the procedure performed by people without medical training.

In between 1969 and 1976 Quebec tried Morgentaler three times for performing illegal abortions outside of hospitals. Juries acquitted him at the trial level each time, accepting his argument that it was necessary for him, as a doctor, to treat those women who came to him in need. Morgentaler did, however, go to jail when the Quebec Court of Appeal overturned an acquittal. (Explicitly in response to this, Pierre Trudeau’s Parliament changed the Criminal Code to disallow appeals courts from overturning jury acquittals.) His first challenge of the abortion restrictions in the Criminal Code at the Supreme Court level in 1976 failed.

It didn’t stop him.

Morgentaler opened clinics in Winnipeg and Toronto in 1983; the Toronto clinic eventually became the centre of the case that would change abortion law in Canada. This time, Morgentaler’s challenge of abortion laws, based on the then-still-new Charter of Rights and Freedoms, was successful. Abortion was decriminalized in Canada and it has remained so ever since. Morgentaler went back to the Supreme Court in 1993 and successfully prevented the provinces from regulating abortion out of existence.

All of this was not without cost. Morgentaler received innumerable death threats. (He famously kept the mailed ones in thick stacks.) Anti-abortion activists firebombed his clinic on Harbord Street twice, in 1983 and 1992; the second attempt successfully burned down the clinic. Morgentaler built another to replace it. He wore a bulletproof vest to work and installed bulletproof glass in his home, and kept on going until he retired from active practice in 2006. Even then he continued to organize and assist with the pro-choice movement in Canada.

Henry Morgentaler, more than anybody else, changed public views on abortion in this country. He made it his life’s work to ensure that women in Canada would have choice, and that we understood that abortion was that—a question about the choices women had available to them. He would be the first to say that he was hardly solely responsible for this change, but someone had to be the tip of the spear-point and Morgentaler chose to take that on. It was for this reason, for his immense sacrifices for the public good, that Canada awarded Morgentaler the Order of Canada in 2010.

Morgentaler himself would at this point likely note that he leaves his work unfinished, as most people do. Late in his life he worked to organize new abortion clinics in the northern territories; Prince Edward Island to this day has no clinics of its own. The struggle for abortion rights in Canada continues. It will now continue without its greatest champion.

]]>http://torontoist.com/2013/05/henry-morgentaler-1923-2013/feed/6Toronto Has a New Feminist Film Journalhttp://torontoist.com/2013/04/toronto-has-a-new-feminist-film-journal/
http://torontoist.com/2013/04/toronto-has-a-new-feminist-film-journal/#commentsTue, 09 Apr 2013 14:00:35 +0000http://torontoist.com/?p=246228Cléo's just-released first issue offers in-depth film criticism from a feminist perspective.

In 1962, French director Agnès Varda released Cléo de cinq à sept, a film that remains greatly respected for its sophisticated ways of approaching existentialism and mortality, all through a strong feminist lens. It’s from this film—and in response to its vivid and varied depiction of how women perceive and are perceived—that Cléo, a new journal […]

]]>Cléo's just-released first issue offers in-depth film criticism from a feminist perspective.

Detail of Cléo‘s first cover image.

In 1962, French director Agnès Varda released Cléo de cinq à sept, a film that remains greatly respected for its sophisticated ways of approaching existentialism and mortality, all through a strong feminist lens. It’s from this film—and in response to its vivid and varied depiction of how women perceive and are perceived—that Cléo, a new journal of film, film culture and feminism, has drawn its name.

The editor and founder of Cléo, Kiva Reardon is the staff film writer at TheLoop.ca and has written for publications like Cinema Scope, Reverse Shot, and NOW Magazine (and also, incidentally, Torontoist). Cléo, however, has a different mandate than any of those outlets: first, to allow for a sophisticated and in-depth discussion of film, far beyond a review, through a feminist lens. And then, to provide opportunities for both emerging and established writers to publish their work. Other people involved in the project include managing editor Julia Cooper and contributing editor Mallory Andrews.

The journal will be published online on a quarterly basis, and so far there’s no charge for readers. The inaugural Spring 2013 issue is currently available. The theme of the issue, “flesh,” is explored in various ways. One essay examines body politics and biology in Zero Dark Thirty; another looks at the radical (and often extremely uncomfortable) ways that intimacy is portrayed in 1997’s Gummo and 2012’s Spring Breakers, both written and directed by Harmony Korine. Somewhere between an academic journal and mainstream film review, Cléo’s first issue artfully walks the line between accessibility and in-depth, well-researched inquiry.

The journal is currently accepting submissions for its second issue, the theme of which will be “home.” 200-word abstracts are due by May 1st 2013. As the editors explain: “for our second instalment we are interested in the ways space is rendered both onscreen and off. The topic of home is an opportunity to critically engage with gendered spaces.”

Torontoist is ending the year by naming our Heroes and Villains: the very best and very worst people, places, things, and ideas that have had an influence on the city over the past 12 months. From December 10 to 19, we’ll unveil the nominees, grouped by category. Vote for your favourites from each batch, every […]

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Torontoist is ending the year by naming our Heroes and Villains: the very best and very worst people, places, things, and ideas that have had an influence on the city over the past 12 months. From December 10 to 19, we’ll unveil the nominees, grouped by category. Vote for your favourites from each batch, every single day! On December 19 and 20 the winners from each category go head-to-head in the final round of voting, and on December 21, we will reveal your choices for Toronto’s Superhero and Supervillain of the year.

You know something’s gone wrong when you’re forced to check the calendar multiple times to ensure that it is in fact 2012. Though the police aren’t calling assault victims sluts anymore (they have since turned to offering fashion advice to pedestrians getting hit by cars), we were still left with a year where newsfeeds found themselves carrying story after story of harassment incidents: some online, and some much closer to home.

One case that had jaws dropping around the world involved Anita Sarkeesian, a former York University student who found herself on the receiving end of harassment from male gamers, including rape and death threats, after she called attention to the stereotypes that female characters were forced into in video games. A particularly gruesome attack took the form of an online game where players were presented the opportunity to bash in Sarkeesian’s face until it eventually became a bloody mess.

Guthrie determined that the game’s creator was one Ben “Bendilin” Spurr, a 25-year-old from Sault Ste Marie, who attempted to defend the game on the grounds that it wasn’t about hitting women but hitting “a selfish person.” Guthrie’s challenges—important especially because they showed how prominently misogyny persists in the gaming world—gained rapid and widespread support. Unfortunately, and reinforcing the concern that gaming culture still has a long way to go in this regard, Guthrie was quickly hit with the same kinds of threats and harassment she was attempting to expose. Guthrie’s attackers certainly deny it, but this harassment transcends the computer screen, and takes a real toll on its victims.

Guthrie’s activism, too, transcends the computer screen: after a string of assaults earlier this year in the Christie Pits area, she helped to organize Take Back the Block events in several neighbourhoods, to focus on constructive, community-oriented ways of responding to such incidents.

Though many have trolled in gleeful anonymity throughout the internet’s short lifespan, Guthrie has shown that harassers must be held (and will be held) accountable for their actions online as well as off. Though it’s disappointing to see that even today, the online assault against Sarkeesian continues in full force (TEDxWomen had to disable the comments and ratings of her recent talk), it’s only with more people like Guthrie coming forward to call that kind of behaviour out that we’ll be able to make progress.

Torontoist is ending the year by naming our Heroes and Villains: the very best and very worst people, places, things, and ideas that have had an influence on the city over the past 12 months. From December 10 to 19, we’ll unveil the nominees, grouped by category. Vote for your favourites from each batch, every […]

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Torontoist is ending the year by naming our Heroes and Villains: the very best and very worst people, places, things, and ideas that have had an influence on the city over the past 12 months. From December 10 to 19, we’ll unveil the nominees, grouped by category. Vote for your favourites from each batch, every single day! On December 19 and 20 the winners from each category go head-to-head in the final round of voting, and on December 21, we will reveal your choices for Toronto’s Superhero and Supervillain of the year.

This past summer, tensions were high in the Christie Pits area after a sharp increase in sexual assaults on women in the neighborhood. Despite the public awareness work done by Toronto’s SlutWalk organizers in 2011, some in Toronto still dispensed terrible “rape prevention” advice, like former lingerie league football player (and mayor’s niece) Krista Ford, who advised women in a Tweet to “carry mace, take self-defense classes, and don’t dress like a whore.”

Ford’s tweet was swiftly and roundly condemned. But the strongest rebuttal came via an open letter to Ford written by comedian and improviser Alice Moran, who publicly outed herself as one of the women who’d been assaulted (a teenage suspect was taken into custody six weeks later). In her letter, Moran gently made the obvious point that she and the other victims had done nothing to justify the assaults that had been committed—as there was no justification for them, no matter what the victims were wearing.

This wasn’t the first time the Second City alumna had written an open letter; she’d addressed a National Post article demeaning female comics earlier in the summer, and in 2011, wrote an uncharacteristically scathing rebuttal to a Christie Blatchford column on the collective mourning of Jack Layton. But her unfailingly polite letter to Ford touched a chord, and earned her a brief but intense media spotlight, which she used to speak about the insidious behaviour of “slut-shaming.” An abashed Ford quickly apologized for her remarks.

In addition to being an ad hoc advocate for more enlightened gender attitudes, Moran was also a champion for her chosen community, Toronto’s comedians. She parlayed a deft knack for pop culture parody (first displayed in a series of viralvideos for The Second City Network) into one of Bad Dog Theatre‘s most successful shows since their difficultrelocation: Throne of Games, which Moran co-produced. (It’s being remounted in January at the Next Stage Theatre Festival.) Moran was also approached to co-write and star in another satire, the stage show Spank! The Fifty Shades Parody. Along with colleagues Colin Munch, Jon Blair, and Ian MacIntyre, she helped create what’s become a smash hit Stateside, with touring productions scheduled in over two dozen American cities in 2013.

Moran has, in any number of ways, stuck her neck out. She didn’t have to respond at all to Krista Ford’s errant statement, or could have responded abstractly, without identifying herself as one of the assault victims. Her choice to let us all into her very personal life in the hopes of shifting the way we talk about assault and its victims was gutsy and generous. When she performs in the remount of Throne of Games next month, Moran will be taking on a new character—that of the young princess Daenerys Targaryen, who eventually becomes a dragon-wrangling queen and slavery abolitionist. It’s one that’s nicely in the spirit of her conduct this year.

CORRECTION: December 16, 2:50PM Ian MacIntyre’s name was previous misspelled as “McIntyre.” The correction has been made to the post above.

This evening at the Centre for Social Innovation, the second in a two-part discussion series about the current state of women in municipal politics. Tonight’s talk is called “The Front Page“; panelists will discuss how female politicians are covered in the media, and the effect this has on women’s political engagement more broadly.

]]>http://torontoist.com/2012/05/watch-live-women-in-toronto-politics-a-panel-discussion-part-two/feed/0CONTACT 2012: Off With Her Headhttp://torontoist.com/2012/05/contact-2012-off-with-her-head/
http://torontoist.com/2012/05/contact-2012-off-with-her-head/#commentsFri, 25 May 2012 18:30:51 +0000http://torontoist.com/?p=159866

The CONTACT Photography Festival runs from May 1 to May 31. We’ll be profiling selected artists and shows throughout the month. “Glass Ceiling“ O’Born Contemporary (131 Ossington Avenue) Runs to June 2; Tuesday to Saturday, 11 a.m.–6 p.m. It’s telling that in Jill Greenberg’s latest exhibition, “Glass Ceiling,” none of the faces of the women […]

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The CONTACT Photography Festival runs from May 1 to May 31. We’ll be profiling selected artists and shows throughout the month.

It’s telling that in Jill Greenberg’s latest exhibition, “Glass Ceiling,” none of the faces of the women are visible. In fact, these almost-naked women are barely keeping their heads above the water. The world of art—photography, painting, and all—is (let’s face it) still largely a man’s world. Since graduating with a senior thesis entitled The Female Object, Greenberg has explored this state of affairs and broader feminist questions in her work, remarking on the difficulties women face when competing against men.

In 2008 Greenberg came under fire when she, tasked with photographing Republican presidential candidate John McCain for the Atlantic, decided to create political art for her own website and so cast him in a sinister light. She has since noted the incident in her bio as such: “The violent backlash from her political art has informed this return to the question of what is tolerated by women in our culture.”

We recently had a chance to speak with Greenberg (who is currently on a shoot in Brazil) about feminism, shooting underwater, and whether or not the term “glass ceiling” is still an appropriate metaphor for female oppression.

Torontoist: What difficulties did you find shooting underwater?

Jill Greenberg: The medium-format studio-portrait camera with the underwater housing, with two underwater flashes on folding arms, is very, very awkward. I am wearing full scuba gear, weights, and an air tank, sitting at the bottom of a 13-foot-deep outdoor swimming pool in L.A.

I tend to make my personal shoots very difficult: wild horses, grizzly bears, toddlers. Somehow it works out.

The women in your photographs could be seen as decapitated, dead, drowned, or disposed of, to name a few—but in the centre of it all (in the photographs and physical gallery space) are the high heels/glass slipper. Which do you think our society is more obsessed with: the beauty or the violence?

I think we are all obsessed with beauty; only some of the population enjoys violence (men!).

Photo by Jill Greenberg.

There’s a particular photo that stands out mainly because it flips the water/ceiling to the ground so the woman is now on top. Was there a different message you were trying to send with this one?

Perhaps it reminds me of Narcissus. She is peacocking and her reflection is quite visible. We know how that went. My idea has always been about the impossibility of the perfection we women are told to aspire to. The fact that they wear heels underwater seems absurd, but these swimmers are dressed for work. Heels are part of the costume/kit they wear when performing.

These photographs could be interpreted as women coming up for air after being suffocated by patriarchy. But the women could easily be seen here as fish, and the surface of the water (that is, the glass ceiling) is actually keeping them alive by being above them. Thinking now to the backlash you faced for the McCain photograph, it does seems that women get cut up and chewed out if they manage to pass this ceiling and one-up men. It’s disturbing to think that there may be a metaphor worse than the “glass ceiling” to describe the oppression of women. What are your thoughts on this?

I could go on about the sad state of affairs for women in the world. North America is better than the Middle East or Africa, of course, but it’s misleading to think the playing field is flat. The rules are different for men and women. It didn’t really sink in for me until I was into my 40s.

As a photographer who goes by the name “The Manipulator” and does intense work in post-production, where do you feel the line should be drawn in terms of altering an image (referring to art versus objectification of women, for example)?

I have actually dropped that name, since when I first used it for my website, in 1995, I was one of very few photographers using digital imaging software. Now, of course, “Photoshop” is a verb, an adjective. And much of my work is captured in camera, with lighting. I don’t think there should be rules about images, unless it’s specifically photojournalism. I think everyone needs to be aware that all pictures lie, even if they are not Photoshopped, since slicing a 500th of a second out of a scene, in some cases a staged scene, is not going to tell a truthful story.

Is it possible to critique the objectification of women without incidentally turning the woman into an object in the critique?

No, it is not. It’s a conundrum, but I have reconciled myself to it. Image making and photography, specifically, objectify the subject. There is a power dynamic at play between the viewer and the viewed. This is one of the times that the gender of the artist is significant to the interpretation of the work.

This evening at the Centre for Social Innovation, the first in a two-part discussion series about the current state of women in municipal politics. Tonight’s talk is called “The Comment Section“; panelists will discuss how women’s voices figure into conversations about Toronto politics and municipal affairs.